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WELCOME

Hello, and a warm welcome to all of my new subscribers! 

This month's feature article explores ways you can increase your
book's ranking on the search results page of Amazon.com. 

In the Recommended Resources section, you'll find information about
the new Amazon Author Stores, testing children's books for lead
content, publicity for nonfiction books, and resources for writers.

My new series of book marketing ebooks will be published starting
in mid-February.  The first two titles are The Savvy Book
Marketer's Guide to Selling Your Book to Libraries, and The Savvy
Book Marketer's Guide to Successful Social Marketing. Stay tuned
for details!

Best wishes for a healthy, happy, and successful year!

Dana

FEATURE STORY

How to Increase Your Book's Visibility in Amazon's Search Results

Amazon.com customers typically search for books by author, title, or
keyword. Like search engines, Amazon uses several criteria in
deciding which products to display on the search results page and
in what order to display them. Popularity (the number of books
already sold on Amazon) and how well the book matches the keywords
are major factors in determining the results of keyword searches.

The more books you sell on Amazon, the more books you will sell in
the future, because your book will appear higher in the search
results. In addition, many customers assume that the best-selling
book must be the best one on the topic.

One way to increase your book's popularity, and therefore its
search results placement, is to direct all of your online book
orders to
Amazon. 

It's also important to make sure your book matches popular search
terms entered by customers. If your book is not yet published, you
can add important keywords to the book's title and subtitle. Some
publishers use long subtitles in order to pack in as many keywords
as possible. 

To capitalize on searches for keywords not contained in your title
and subtitle, enter important keywords into Amazon's Search Tag
feature.  Near the bottom of the Tags section (about halfway down
your book page), look for "Help others find this product - tag it
for Amazon search" and click on the "suggest" button.

You can't use keywords that already appear in Amazon's search
function, such as the book title or author name. Word order
matters, so create different search tags with variations on your
most important keywords. After you enter a keyword, you must to
tell Amazon why you think the book should be indexed under that
particular term. 

Amazon staff members approve Search Tags, so make sure your tag and
your explanation are relevant and don't sound like a sales pitch.
It's best to use the keyword phrase within your explanation. You
can submit up to ten search terms for you book. If you have
additional search terms to enter, ask a colleague to enter some for
you. 

Another way to increase your popularity on Amazon.com is do a virtual
book tour or an "Amazon best-seller campaign," designed to push up
your Amazon sales rank by generating a large number of orders on a
single day. 

There are a number of other ways to promote your book on Amazon,
including getting lots of good Amazon reviews, writing reviews of
other related books, participating in the Look Inside program,
creating an Amazon Connect blog, enhancing your book description,
participating in Amazon forums for your book's topic, and creating
Listmania lists and So You'd Like To guides. 

For a more in-depth look at Amazon promotions, I recommend Aiming
at Amazon, by Aaron Shepard.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/093849743X/ref=nosim?tag= texanpubli-20

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES

Amazon Launches Author Stores

Amazon.com has launched a new feature called Author Stores. Right
now it's in beta testing, by invitation only. Visit this page for
more details, and get on the mailing list to receive information
from Amazon.  http://snipr.com/authorstores

Children's Books Affected by New Law

The new consumer safety law requiring that children's books be
tested for lead content has is causing problems for publishers,
printers and booksellers.
SPAN has compiled a web page with helpful information on this issue.
http://www.spannet.org/cpsia-info-2009.htm

Keep Your Nonfiction Book in the News

See this article for some terrific publicity tips from publicist
Sandra Beckwith. For a step-by-step guide to creating publicity
materials, I recommend Sandra's ebook, Publicity Forms & Templates.

http://snipr.com/nonfictionpublicity

http://www.buildbookbuzz.com/products/index.htm

Savvy Book Marketer Guides
 
The Savvy Book Marketer Guides is a new series of step-by-step
ebooks designed to help authors and independent publishers master
specific book marketing strategies. The first two titles, Selling
to Libraries and Successful Social Marketing, will be available in
mid-February. Stay tuned for details.

Preditors & Editors Award

I'm pleased to report that my Book Marketing Maven blog was awarded
the "Truly Useful Site" award from Preditors & Editors this month.
Check out their site for a long list of resources for writers.

http://www.bookmarketingmaven.com

http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/

Free Book Marketing Ebook Available

As a special thank you to my readers and subscribers, I've compiled
a free ebook, Top Book Marketing Tips of 2008 featuring a
collection of popular articles from the Book Marketing Maven blog
and The Savvy Book Marketer newsletter. If you haven't already done
so, downloaded your copy here. You're welcome to pass this ebook on
to others. http://budurl.com/BookMarketingTips

SHARE THE LOVE

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with another author
or publisher. Thanks!

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ABOUT

Dana Lynn Smith
Book Marketing Maven
 
As a book marketing coach, I specialize in developing targeted
marketing plans for nonfiction books. 

See my Book Marketing Maven blog for more book promotion tips.
http://www.bookmarketingmaven.com
 
Follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/BookMarketer

Find me on Facebook at http://profile.to/danalynnsmith/

Connect on Book Marketing Network at
http://bookmarket.ning.com/profile/DanaLynnSmith